Dear Mr. President,
After three hours of watching television Monday evening that began with another of your polite and reasonable appeals to the nation, it's clear that the talk, the debates, the interviews about the financial crisis engulfing most Americans assuredly is doing nothing to excite your supporters and in fact is making most of us feel brain dead.
The Republicans who want to replace you, along with those silly little women from Minnesota and Alaska who have the audacity to believe they can defeat you. But neither has a prayer of winning enough primaries to matter. Cable television and National Public Radio gives them unwarranted air time, but that does not legitimize their candidacy. The game is all about is ratings, getting politicians to scream at each other. The Republicans will do anything they can to defeat your re-election bid. One of their principal spokesmen, Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky has been saying all along that your defeat is his obsession. But to hear the Republicans claim to know what the American people want would cause you eye strain trying to find any credible African Americans, Latinos or working-class or unemployed Americans among the mostly all-white GOP leadership when it appears on the top of Capitol Hill to make their case to the television cameras.
What truly concerns Americans is getting back to work. Jobs are what grate most unemployed Americans. Lack of them affects the ownership of their homes, the amount of food they can put on the table, the lives they once were accustomed to living, the quality of the schools where they can send their children. It means being able to hold their heads high. Nobody, but nobody wants to stand in line at an unemployment office. Most of the unemployed worry about the medical bills for their families. How many of those glib members of Congress have ever had to cope with that problem?
Everyone talks jobs, but neither the politicians nor civic leaders offer any specificity. Serious people may agree with the notion to construct a nationwide rail system powered by electricity. It would go a long way toward solving our unemployment crisis. But especially as long as the nation is trapped in a troubled economy.
Most Americans always admire a fighter. They want you to do battle with your opponents the way you did when you were seeking the presidential nomination three years ago. A dose of candor might cause the public opinion polls to jump like you might never before have imagined.